


One of Many

by scatteringmyashes



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Sense8 (TV) Fusion, Don't Have to Know Sense8 Canon, Implied Relationships, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-11
Updated: 2015-11-11
Packaged: 2018-05-01 01:45:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5187455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scatteringmyashes/pseuds/scatteringmyashes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They're different, they've never met, and they know everything about one another. The Avengers before they're a team have a bond deeper than any other; this is how it looks.</p><p>A Sense8 AU in which you need to know little about Sense8.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One of Many

**Author's Note:**

> So instead of working on my other fic I made the great decision of starting another one. I toyed with the idea of this being a series or something but as of right now I just don't have the time for it. Maybe I'll add more on a later date. Enjoy!

The first time she sees him, it’s in a dream. She knows it’s a dream because when she closed her eyes she was in the red room, falling asleep to the sound of a dozen other girls breathing. The first time she sees him, he’s performing in front of more people than she has ever seen in her life. He doesn’t notice her, too busy not falling from the tightrope while firing arrows at a target hidden to her by blinding lights. Natalia, who doesn’t have a last name, watches in silence as this strange boy gains cheers and approval from people he will never know. 

It’s strange, it’s a dream, and when she wakes up she thinks nothing of it. At least, she tries not to. But in her calm moments, those between the trials or when other girls are being put to the test, her usually controlled mind wanders and she sees him again. His name is Clint, Natalia knows, though she doesn’t know how she knows that. 

And it isn’t just strange visions, seeing him when she’s certain she’s awake, but feeling him. Natalia experiences what a hot dog tastes like, what it’s like to feel the blistering heat of a summer day on tanned skin that is both hers and is entirely foreign, what sound a bowstring makes when it is released after being pulled taunt. And sometimes he is there with her, shivering in the cold, holding back tears as the teachers scream in their face, eyes narrowing with focus as she spars with girls twice her size. Natalia is not a big girl, not physically, but mentally she is more than the leaders of the red room will ever know.

They do not talk, Natalia and this strange boy Clint. She does not want to believe he exists and he is happy to keep it that way. Different is not normal for them, is not safe for them. And they certainly are not in possession of an excess amount of comfort in the first place. But sometimes, every few weeks, they will hear whispers from the other’s world.

“You’re doing that wrong,” said in a Midwestern American accent by a boy older than Clint, but not dissimilar, whom Natalia eventually recognizes as his brother. 

“Again!” An order, snapped at the redhead girl as she dances in a place with no red on the walls but is called the Red Room. 

The languages are different; Natalia has no knowledge of English nor does Clint have any of Russian, but nothing is a secret between them. Clint is there when Natalia wonders what will become of her. Natalia is there when Clint wonders what his parents are doing. They are two separate people but they are the same. 

They do not talk for the longest time, aware of the other much like one is aware of a ghost or a shadow, but eventually they talk. Natalia is throwing daggers at a target, something she has done plenty of times before, but this is different. She is almost old enough for the final test, old enough to be expected to be perfect. Any slight mistake could mean death. She is old enough to know that her masters are not forgiving. 

And this time, missing even by a hair’s length means that her knife will imbed itself into a girl’s flesh one way or another. Natalia is too old to make mistakes, too old to feel concern, but she is not too old to feel fear.

But she is too old to make mistakes and every knife flies from her hand in a beautiful arc, turning in the air, and embedding itself into the target. 

It is cold in Russia. It is always cold. Natalia is used to it. But suddenly she is warm and shirtless and covered in hot, sticky sweat that runs down her face and arms as she examines another knife in her hand. Natalia realizes she is not herself but another moment in time when she is Clint, when they are one person and share everything. Unnerving is one way of putting it.

“Well come on.” She turns her head and sees another person, this one a man with brown hair, looking at her impatiently. “Throw it at the target, Clint. You aren’t gonna get better without practice.” The man is tall and intimidating and Natalia can tell that Clint is scared of him, of his disapproval, of what he can do. But while she has felt fear many times and knows the feeling of pain just as well, neither come to mind when she looks at this new stranger.

“This is not difficult,” Natalia replies, though she does not know any English. Her voice is deeper, rougher, and not marked by even the hints of an accent. 

“Don’t fuck this up,” a third person says. Natalia looks to the side, her other side, and sees Clint. But she is Clint; she looks down to check and indeed, this is not her body it is too big and bulky, not slim and powerful like hers is. Clint is watching with barely concealed interest. “Show me what you can do.” There is just the smallest hint of a challenge, his tone of voice questioning whether this small girl with red hair can really do better than he can.

So Natalia takes the knife and throws it at the target. The brunette’s mouth drops open. So does Clint’s. She looks at the blonde and gives him a cold look. If she knew how, she would smirk, but that is not a reaction the red room has taught her. Yet.

“That is what I can do,” Natalia tells Clint. But suddenly she is herself again and Clint is standing next to his mentor and looking confused at the sudden switch. The brunette man is rambling about hidden skills or unlocked potential; all things Natalia thinks is fake. There is only skill gained from practice. Potential exists in everyone. 

“Natalia!” She is brought back to Russia by a strong voice and a cold stare. A few days later, she goes under for surgery and emerges as a different person. 

Natalia is kept in Russia as a spy, an assassin, a weapon under another’s control. She does not leave for a very, very long time.

\---------------------

Some people would call it a twin thing. The people in their little town certainly do. It’s never just Wanda or just Pietro, it’s always Wanda and Pietro or Pietro and Wanda. The two are inseparable, but it’s ok because they’re twins. They’re twins with no father and if they’re a bit weird, well, nobody really mentions it because everyone’s a bit strange nowadays. Besides, there’s more to worry about when it comes down to it.

Being next door neighbors to the Soviet Union isn’t exactly a cup of tea, after all. The citizens know that the only reason they aren’t already part of the Red Empire is because of foreign interests. They have raw materials that the West would like to control and they’re strong enough to keep any communist interests away. 

So Wanda and Pietro are allowed to wander around together and if anyone thinks they see strange things, like Wanda moving things without touching them or Pietro moving so fast he is little more than a blur, well they keep it to themselves. Nobody wants to draw attention to their sleepy part of the world. They want to preserve the peace for as long as possible. It’s only natural, after all.

“Do you think we’ll ever see America?” Wanda asks one day as the two wander down the streets of their sleepy town. Pietro shrugs. Even though they are twins he is already a bit taller and his pale blonde hair seems to lose color every week. Wanda likes to tease him and say that it’ll be nothing more than white by the time they’re ten. They’re five and he makes fun of her for all sorts of things, but neither of them mean it.

“Do you want to see America?” He replies. Wanda thinks about it. She’s been having strange dreams recently, of places that are so foreign they have to be the mysterious foreign country. She sees a circus tent that’s purple and red and gold. She sees a television with a man speaking in English behind a desk. Wanda doesn’t understand English but she understands what he’s saying and he’s talking about the Cold War and about some man named Andropov. 

“I would like to visit. Someday,” Wanda admits. Pietro nods and they continue walking in silence for several minutes. They aren’t holding hands, they’re too old for that, but their steps are in sync and their minds seem to be acting as one. It scares adults, sometimes, how they can have entire conversations without saying a single word. 

“Then one day we will go to America.” Pietro smiles at his sister, his little sister, and she nods. “We will see New York and all the skyscrapers that are so tall you cannot see the sky. We will take pictures with Lady Liberty and we will have new places to play games.” Pietro’s smile is big and pure and Wanda knows he is telling the truth. 

They are too young to understand the impossibility of them ever leaving their little country, their little home that is between two powers and is no more than a pawn on a giant chessboard that is known as the Cold War. All they know is that they have no father and their mother will not talk about him, that they are Jewish in a place where it is not safe to be Jewish, and that all they have is one another.

“Do you think we will ever find father?” Pietro wonders, picking up on what his sister is thinking. She stops and shrugs, looking down at the ground. Pietro frowns and understands that she is scared and nervous and doesn’t know if she wants to meet the man who left them or not. “It is ok, sister. We do not need him to know that we are a family.” Wanda looks up at him and forces a smile.

You are the only family I need. They both think it and they both smile and Pietro rests his forehead against hers and that is all they need to know. As long as we have each other, everything will be ok. It is a promise and an oath that neither intend on breaking.

The next day, the Soviet Union begins to invade their small little country. Wanda and Pietro hear about it a day later. In a week, they are under communist control. In three weeks there are bombs raining down indiscriminately. They have the name Stark on the side. 

\---------------------

He has always wanted to fly. As a child, Superman is his favorite hero. The man of steel is perfect, immune to almost anything, but also human at his core. Yet, at the same time, Superman is nothing like any other man Sam knows. Not to say that he doesn’t look up to his father or grandfather, but they aren’t Superman. They can’t fly. They aren’t perfect. Then again, as he would later (much later, when he’s mature and an adult and knows more about the world) realize, they didn’t need to be.

Sam dreams of being able to fly with a cape and, as he grows older, with his own pair of wings. Birds are fascinating to him. His child mind can watch the sparrows hop across the ground, so awkward, and marvel at how they could become the most graceful of things only a moment later. Even the multitude of pigeons around his home are a source of fascination, if only because they could contrast the more beautiful and elegant of their kind.

“I’m gonna fly,” Sam mutters to himself as he climbs up to the balcony of the second floor apartment. He had made his own pair of wings out of cardboard, blankets, and duct tape that he found lying around. It had been a bit awkward to attach them to his arms, but he managed. He even had a pair of goggles to help keep things out of his eyes. 

I can do this, he thinks. A rush of confidence, of strength, hit him and he steps forward and--

He is crying. But it isn’t him. There is a boy in front of him with olive skin and dark, messy hair. And he is crying. Sam is young, yes, but he is old enough to feel the other boy’s pain. But this, this is different than watching his friends skim their knees and have to get their moms to kiss it better. This is much, much different. 

Sam watches this stranger, this other boy, and wants to cry as well. But he has no idea why. The other boy realizes he is not alone, he looks up and sees Sam and goes bright red. He starts stammering up excuses, telling Sam to look away or swearing that he wasn’t crying. But then the other boy frowns.

“How did you get here?” He asks. He stands and Sam is, for whatever reason, pleased to see that they are the exact same height. The other boy is a bit heavier than him, but not by much. Sam is certain, however, that the other boy is wearing much nicer clothes. “This room is locked.” The other boy frowns. “Did you sneak in?” 

“I don’t know. I was just about to fly when I came here.” Sam thinks about it before grinning. “Are you an imaginary friend?” He asks. The other boy’s frown deepens.

“No. I’m real.” He looks around. They are in some kind of office, with a dark wood desk and curtains that Sam yearns to play on. “This is my dad’s study. He’s coming back soon. You should go before he comes back.” There is something sad and also fearful in the strange boy’s voice, but Sam isn’t sure what it is so he doesn’t ask. That’s what his Mama told him; always be polite and mind your manners. It took a while for Sam to understand what manners were, but now he does and he always tries to be mind them.

“I don’t know how,” Sam admits. He shrugs and walks over to the curtains, feeling them with his small hands. They are soft and clear of dust and dirt. “I am real too.” Sam looks back at the other boy. “My name is Sam. Who are you?” 

“Anthony, but only my dad calls me that.” The other boy straightens up, attempting to look taller than he really is. “You can call me Tony. That’s what my friends are gonna call me.” Tony brightens. “Do you want to be my friend?” Sam nods.

“Of course! And we can go flying together?” He asks. Tony thinks about it for a moment before clambering over to his father’s desk and carefully pulling down some blue paper. It is covered with white marks and it takes Sam a moment to recognize that it is a plan for some complicated machine. 

“My dad is making a thing so people can fly.” Tony smiles. “He’s really smart.” Sam looks at the plans and nods in agreement. “We can use this when we get older and go flying, ok?” Tony’s smile wavers and Sam can feel that he’s nervous. He’s scared. He doesn’t know if Sam is real, if this is real or if it’s just a dream, if he can actually have a friend his age or if this is just another creation his mind thought up. 

So Sam opens his mouth to say something, to reassure Tony that they’re friends and they’ll go flying together when his dad is done making the machine, but Tony isn’t there anymore. Sam looks down from the balcony, hears the chirping of birds in the trees, feels the breeze brush past him. 

He steps away from the edge and takes off his wings, willing to wait for his friend so they can go flying together. Sam doesn’t hear from his friend again, not for many years at least, but when he’s much older and hears about a brilliant young inventor named Tony Stark… something's familiar about the man. 

Sam just doesn’t know what.

\---------------------

He is a prince, a god, a warrior among other warriors. He is the son of the king and will one day take the throne. But for now, Thor is just a young boy who plays too many games with his brother and enjoys eating the sweets the kitchens make a little too much. Thor is just a young boy who dreams more than any other Freyja has ever heard and it frightens her, because she cannot understand where he gets these visions from.

Thor is born before humans have even thought of building castles and sailing across oceans, of trading with people with dark skin and light skin, of seeing animals who tower higher than houses, of discovering how to make it bright even in the darkest of nights. But Thor dreams, he dreams of so much that Freyja has never heard of.

He can see a future, except to him it is not a future it is a present and it is full of wonderous things. Places with chariots that require no horse, of lights that can be illuminated with the flick of a wrist, where information can be transmitted across incredible distances within seconds. Thor doesn’t have names for it, or if he does he does not share them, but he tells his mother and his brother plenty of the stories. 

Many of the others think that he is foolish, but Thor doesn’t care. He imagines what Midgard must look like, eager to one day explore and see for himself. He can see other children his age, some who are brilliant minds and others who could give him a fair fight in battle. He feels what they feel and he knows what they know, but it is all too confusing and he pushes it aside. Even if he wants to know, he cannot. 

It hurts him, he realizes as he grows older, to experience these things that are happening but aren’t. Thor asks Heimdall about it, once, after being admonished by his father for not paying attention during a lesson. The young boy asks about Midgard, he wants to know what it’s like, wonders if he will ever go. 

Heimdall chuckles and though it is a pleasant sound it is not one Thor wants to hear. The watchman of Asgard turns his gaze away from the little prince, though of course Thor is still visible. “You dream of a place even I cannot see, Thor. The Midgard I gaze upon is naught but a collection of barbarians hunting for scraps.” He considers it. “Perhaps one day, yes, they will be better. But their lives are so short, so insignificant. There are more important things to consider.” 

Thor thinks about his words and nods. He knows that he is going to be a king one day, he will rule over the nine realms, and he will have more to worry about that just one small space on the tree of life. He should focus on his studies, on being a better warrior and making his parents proud, so he does not ask anymore questions. But the dreams do not just go away, they cannot, and that night he dreams of a boy his age. 

He is cowering in a corner, pain shooting up and down his body, and the emotion he’s experiencing is so foreign that Thor freezes. It is, he will later understand, is how fear feels. But Thor is young, he is a prince, he is a god, and he does not know what fear is. 

Thor stands up and he is shorter than normal, he is smaller in general, but he is filled with a sense of courage. He is not blonde and his name is not Thor, it is Bruce, and he is not used to being like this.

Bruce walks forward, out of the corner, and into the living room. He stares at everything with wide eyes, because he is not who he usually is. Bruce is watching another person move his body, watching this stranger, too scared to say anything.

“This is most unusual,” Thor mutters, too soft to really be heard over the sound of the television. Bruce flinches on instinct, glancing at his father while Thor is drawn to the light and color flashing on screen. Fortunately for both, Bruce’s father is fast asleep with a cheap beer in one hand and the remote in the other. 

“What are you doing?” Bruce squeaks, finally able to talk as his sense of curiosity overrides his terror. Thor pokes the TV screen and frowns in confusion.

“What is this box of color?” He asks. Bruce feels himself relax. Though he knows nothing about this person, his voice is so innocent and his entire temperament is too… curious for him to be much of a danger. Bruce does not feel the same frozen fear that happens when his father enters a room. Rather, this stranger is soothing, a rock in the middle of the storm.

“It’s a TV.” Bruce frowns. “You have TV, right?” He isn’t sure if this is a dream or not, but even in his dreams people have something to watch different shows with. Bruce isn’t a huge fan of most of them, but the science channel always attracts his attention. His father watches them sometimes and Bruce will risk the man’s wrath for just a few minutes about the final frontier.

“We do not. Asgard has many other things, though, and our entertainment is not so…” Thor struggles to find the right word. Bruce nods, knowing what he is trying to say anyway. Some part of his mind should be confused about where Thor is from (and how in the world he knows the blonde’s name at all) but Bruce is not. 

When Thor says Asgard, an entire flurry of images runs through Bruce’s brain. It is a beautiful image and, in that moment, Bruce knows that one day he wants to visit the city made of gold and bronze. 

“Why were you scared?” Thor asks, breaking the chain of thought in favor of a darker topic. Bruce withdrawals a bit, the connection between the boys fading, and Thor panics. He doesn’t want to lose his new friend, this strange person named Bruce (he just knows, just like he knows Bruce would never hurt a fly yet is one of the strongest people he will ever meet), and he clings onto the present.

Thor blinks and he is in his room, pacing the length, a hammer not unsimilar to Mjolnir in his hand. There are drops of sweat that drip down his face and he wonders if he was just dreaming. But in the corner a small figure, one with dark brown hair and tanned skin, no sign of a mischievous smile, appears. 

“Loki…” Thor threatens, stepping forward. But something tells him that this is not Loki, this is someone much different, and he is not surprised when Bruce appears from behind the shadows. 

“Who are you?” Bruce asks, though somehow he already knows the answer. Thor does not have to answer, not with words, but Bruce understands everything and nothing at the same time. Because, after all, they are one person in two different bodies. And that doesn’t even scratch the surface. 

\---------------------

“This isn’t going to work,” a voice in Tony’s head says. The teenager shakes his head and blocks it out, going back to tinkering with his robot. It’s nothing complicated, little more than an arm attached to four wheels, but it’s his and he can make it. “Seriously, the weight distribution is all wrong. I’m not even an engineer or whatever and I can still tell.” Tony looks up and realizes that he isn’t alone.

Tony Stark, heir to the largest tech empire in the world, lets out the most embarrassing scream since he rode the Tower of Terror. There is a blonde kid on the other side of the table, peering at him with sharp blue-green eyes. The stranger lets out a chuckle and extends a hand. “Clint Barton. You must be Tony Stark. I’ve heard a lot about you.” Tony scowls and ignores him.

It’s just another imaginary friend, like Sam was. Don’t worry about it. Tony continues to work on his robot, though he isn’t even sure what it’s going to be used for. Maybe it’ll be good at playing fetch with him or something. Actually that’d be pretty fun, Tony admits as he thinks about it. He flips his visor on his welding mask down and is about to start melting bits of metal together when someone pokes him.

“Oi, listen to me.” It’s that vision, Clint. He’s scowling and has his arms crossed. Tony notes that he’s well-built; he must do a lot of physical labor. “That isn’t going to work. The weight is all off.” Tony lets out a sigh, flips the visor back up, and starts rambling about how the metal alloys he picked are light enough to balance out, how the base will be significantly heavier due to the motor, and that this strange boy who isn’t even real should just shut up and leave him alone.

Clint’s scowl grows. “I’m not a boy. I’m fifteen.” Tony rolls his eyes and mutters something that the blonde can’t pick up. He goes back to his work. It’s nothing important, he tells himself. Tony knows that he’s not a normal kid, that he’s a genius compared even to his old man, and he figures that he just imagines other people around him because he’s lonely. Well, not lonely. Who could possibly be lonely with so many people at his beck and call? I’m not lonely, Tony thinks. 

He opens his mouth to tell his hallucination that, but Clint is gone. Tony pretends that it doesn’t bother him and he most certainly doesn’t look up whether he’s on anything that can cause hallucinations so vivid that they can touch you.

He doesn’t like what he finds. 

\--------------------

Long ago, Natasha dreamed of a boy who had blonde hair and fired arrows like she threw daggers. It was nothing more than a dream, an imaginary friend that she is not allowed to have anymore, not that she was allowed at all. Such things were for children and she is not a child. She never has been.

Natasha no longer dreams of Clint and his strange ways in a place far away called America, but she does not forget him. She remembers him and she sees glimpses of other things, things that cannot be real, and when she imagines that she’s standing there when Tony Stark takes over his father’s company she convinces herself that it was nothing more than a strange dream. 

Stark’s face is on every news station across the globe, it isn’t hard to tell herself that it was an illusion. Besides, Natasha never knows when she might need to kill him. 

She’s twenty three and she could kill a man in more than a dozen ways unarmed. It’s not all training. Some of it, much of it, is practical experience. 

There are people in Natasha’s life, people who train her and teach her knew ways to kill. A tall woman with thin lips, a large man with a metal arm, a dozen faces and names that Natasha always will remember. She was taught to know everything, track every person, because she would never know when some small piece of information could save her life.

Natasha is Natalia and she is Natalie and she is a spy and an assassin. 

She does not have loyalties to anyone other than her Red Room masters, she does not care for anyone other than herself, and she does not have an imaginary friend named Clint Barton who has blonde hair and fires arrows. 

But she is sent to America to kill someone when a man wearing purple and using a bow spots her. They look into one another’s eyes and Natasha is hit by a shocking familiarity. It’s wrong to say that it’s a bond because she’s trained not to form anything like that, not to be close to people, but there’s something there. 

“Are you going to kill me?” Natasha asks in a clear, perfect American accent. She is in a clear street, no cover in sight, and no doubt the man could fire his arrows before she could even raise a hand. 

The man looks at her and frowns. He shakes his head and lowers his bow. “Natalia?” He asks. Natasha is struck with her old name, one that she hasn’t used in years. “It’s me. It’s Clint.” 

Natasha does not have loyalties to anyone but her masters because that is too dangerous, but she has a bond beyond words with this man she has just met. 

\---------------------

Steve opens his eyes in a brand new world, one he’s never wanted, and he can feel the emptiness in his chest the moment he takes his first breath. They’re gone, he realizes. And he’s somewhere he doesn’t recognize, somewhere achingly familiar but foreign nonetheless. He escapes and runs, runs as fast as he can but everything is brighter and louder and there’s a man telling him that he’s been asleep.

Asleep. It’s a mockery, really. After everything he’s done, everything he’s tried to do, he’s still alive. The others aren’t. He can tell. Steve tries, every night, to reach out and connect with someone. He refuses to believe what Fury tells him, that his entire squad is gone. But he can’t find them, he can only sense hints of the psycellium that once bonded him with seven others.

And to top it all off, the strange man named Fury, who wears an eyepatch and a dark leather trench coat even when it's blisteringly hot outside, tells him that the tesseract has been stolen by some psychopath. It takes all of Steve's control not to punch a wall. As it is, he settles for an extreme amount of passive aggressive comments while he wishes for Peggy's cold front or even Bucky's ability to put on a facade better than any Hollywood actor. 

God Bucky. He's gone. He's been gone the longest and Steve doesn't think he'll ever wake up without that reminder in his heart. He doesn't know if he'll ever deserve to be at peace for what happened, for what he did. And without the bond, without the rest of his little group of commandos, Steve doesn't know how he'll go on. It was bad enough, losing one of his commandos and his love, with six others there to support him. How is he supposed to do it alone? 

But he isn't alone, not entirely. Not yet. Peggy is awake and alive and Steve goes to visit her as soon as even a whisper of a connection appears. Sometimes he wishes that he hadn't, but most days he's glad he did. 

Because that isn't the Peggy he remembers, not the one with bright and fierce eyes, with brown curls that look like they could survive hell and back, with a sharp tongue that could put the fear of God in Hitler himself. No, this woman is only a shadow of Peggy Carter's former self. Steve can see the hint of fierceness, the dim light of fire, but most of it is gone. Most of Peggy's memories are gone too. 

When she sees and senses him for the first time in over seventy years, she doesn't believe her eyes. It's got to be another illusion, another dream created from the mass of drugs and God-knows what else they have pumped into her body. But Steve gives her a weak smile and his walls come crumbling down and Peggy can sense him, knows he's there, and when she reaches out a frail hand they touch and it is everything she's wanted for the past seventy years and more. 

They talk for hours. It feels like minutes. But someone is talking to Steve on the other end and he can't ignore them, no matter how much he feels like he deserves his own time. 

Because the world needs saving once again and, well, Steve always was a hero.


End file.
